Although I’m not sure that I want to collect the entire catalogues of either Worlds of If or The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, I wouldn’t mind starting a collection of Galaxy (one of the more famous magazines). I’ve been tentative in the past about purchasing magazines for one simple reason: a large percentage of their contents, especially if by well-known authors, are rewritten/expanded/re-conceptualized for later short story collections or novel publication form. Thus, what version you read in the magazine is rarely the more polished version found in later editions. For example, in the August 1965 issue of Galaxy Frank Herbert’s Do I Wake or Dream? was expanded for the 1966 novel publication under the title Destination: Void (which was revised again for the much later 1978 edition). Novels like Dune (1965) are themselves fix-up novels from shorter novels previously serialized in magazines — Dune World (1963) and The Prophet of Dune (1965). However, six magazines for one dollar each was too good of a deal to pass up….

The only magazine I desperately want to collect is New Worlds due to the quantity of experimental New Wave material which was published during Moorcock’s editorship.

I have a few copies of Astounding/Analog from the 50’s – 60’s. The good thing about them is the cover art, but beyond that you are right, if a story is good it is available elsewhere. There’s a lot of what I’d call ‘filler’ stories in those old magazines, not a lot of lost gems to be rediscovered. I would like to come across some issues of New Worlds, or maybe Weird Tales from the 30’s – 40’s though .

You have some primo issues here. It would be well worth your while to follow through with Earthblood, by Laurimer, later independently novelized but great as a series. I don’t care for the illo style on the cover, but the internal illustrations [I remember as] great. I clearly remember characters like Stellaraire and Iron Robert. I am now retired at 62. I read these magazines when they first came out, or flipped through them in the drug store if I didn’t have 50 cents.

Now You can also buy multiple photocopy editions on DVD, although some are frustratingly incomplete.

I read Chapter 2 of a “cliff hanger” serial in “Worlds of IF” in 1963, and encountered Chapter 2 again on a DVD photocopy collection- but not Chapter 3. “Reefs of Space” (Chapter 2) remained as vivid and delightfully scary as the day it imprinted on my 12 year old cortex. In my mind, Our Mysterious Hero has now been suspended only seconds away from a horrible-fate-worse-than-death for almost exactly 50 years.

These magazines are a time machine- to my past, to America’s past, and to yesterday’s future.

I still have all my 60’s mags in a dusty trunk; all are in good shape though perhaps a bit brown around the edges. Sorry, NFS!!

I’ve definitely read up on early women writers in the genre 🙂 For example, few know that Kate Wilhelm and Kit Reed were publishing in magazines in the 60s…. I mean, everyone knows Wilhelm’s 70s masterworks.

Additional notes on “Earthblood” – recalled from reading it once about 46 years ago-

The writing style is not what I think of as typical Laumer. I remember his personae as caricatures, vividly humorous, but what Forrester would call “Flat”, one dimensional. Earthblood’s characters have depth, maturing and changing as the plot develops. The story has pathos, tragedy, adventure, and beauty; overall a solid and fresh rendition of the mystical / archetypal hero’s quest.

The IF cover pic does not remotely do it justice: too impressionistic and bemmy.

Perhaps Laumer was listed as first author of Earthblood because his name was (deservedly) well known in If and Galaxy magazines for Retief stories et. al. : His name on the cover would boost sales;
Ms. RGB was not that well known.

Also interesting that RGB’s name sounded masculine, although it is her real name, unlike James Tiptree.

I have read one other RGB short story many years ago, “Fruiting Body,” also memorable: short, mystical, humorous, and genuinely spooky; very F&SF-type story; in retrospect showing feminine insight from a masculine first-person viewpoint. She may be worth trailing through time.

Perhaps PKD could have remembered it for me wholesale, but lacking total recall- or ready reference copies to review- I write from overall impressions.